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Monitor intermittently turns itself off

I'm having the strangest monitor problems. They started around a month ago: when I first turned my computer on, after a few minutes there'd be some flickering in the back ground followed by a complete black screen. I could fix this for the rest of that session simply by turning it on and off again. This has got progressively worse until currently, where, interestingly, after around 15 minutes now, It'll have a ten minute spree of turning itself off. I've also found it turns itself off when alt-tabbing between certain games, usually one's that don't alt tab very well - Dark messiah of might and magic is the most recent one.

So, what do you think? Is it the monitor or my graphics card? Which is worse??

Try plugging another monitor in and reproducing the same conditions (alt-tabbing, etc). That or install an old GPU and try it on your monitor. That would be the best way to pinpoint the problem.

As for which is worse - it depends entirely on your setup. If you have an 24'' LED monitor that costs 1k or you have the latest gen of GPU that goes for 800 euros... Also if some of your stuff are still under warranty or not, since in any case i don't believe either of them can be repaired and they will require replacing.

I'm having the strangest monitor problems. They started around a month ago: when I first turned my computer on, after a few minutes there'd be some flickering in the back ground followed by a complete black screen. I could fix this for the rest of that session simply by turning it on and off again.

...

So, what do you think? Is it the monitor or my graphics card? Which is worse??

It's the monitor that I turn off, and it only takes a couple of seconds each time. In all honesty dragging out an old monitor or fiddling with another GPU sounds more trouble than it's worth - if things get worse I'll see what I can do.

I wonder, could it be related to overheating? That wouldn't make much sense in that playing high demand games doesn't cause the problem, but I am seeing peaks of 80C with my GPU and 65C for my processor.

Sounds like either
1) your monitor is not reading a signal from your graphics card, so it goes on standby until you reinitialise it
2) the signal from your graphics card is dodgy
3) it's a power thing in your monitor
4) your monitor cable is dodgy

This is why people have suggested switching monitors to make sure that the problem is there, this sounds the most likely.

Have checked if you accidentally turned on the an off timer, I know on my monitor I have it set up to turn off the monitor every couple of hours in case I happen to be away, this is not a screen save it is a setting on the monitor itself, try checking if you have a similar setting.

Otherwise I would suggest it is more the likely a loose power/dvi cable.

Yeah. I used to work in an electronics shop and the number of Caps we sold for dead Samsung PSUs was rather scary considering Samsung's premium.
While Coxxyx has stated its not a Samsung there is still the potential its a capacitor problem by the sound of it. Not sure what to advise beyond cracking the thing open and checking if the PSU has any bulging ones at all.

This is a long shot, but is the monitor plugged into a power strip? I had a problem whereby my monitor would turn itself off when plugged into one, but direct into the wall it's been on for months no problem.

Update: It's definitely a problem with the monitor. Swapping the input from hdmi to vga (PC to Xbox) results in it turning off about two times. If I swap to the xbox in the first ten minutes, when the monitor behaves normally, I go through the 15 minute period of turning on and off just the same as with the PC input. It's worth mentioning that when it turns itself off, the screen simply goes black rather than the power light blinking out. I actually have to double press it.

Sounds like blown caps to me. I had a similar-ish problem (it was really the opposite) where my monitor would flicker before stabilising, I never had it black out after it was 'fully on', though. It was a Samsung 226BW. When I first pressed the power button it would stay black for ages, then get a little brighter, then when it reached the proper brightness it would start strobing very slowly (this was when it was as bad as it got, it was much less severe initially). The strobe rate picked up exponentially until it was like a rave going on in front of my eyes, and it was that exponential...ity that made me think it was the caps; look at an RC time constant graph and you'll see why.

Luckily it's quite an easy fix, it was just five electrolytic caps (in my case anyway) and now the monitor is fine. I bought some pretty expensive caps so hopefully the cathodes will go before the caps do again.

So yeah, in your case, I'd say it's caps because:
- If it were the power supply, it wouldn't stay on; you have to press the power button to turn it off and then press it again to turn it on so the power supply still works.
- The LCD and the processor for it still work because the monitor works when it... Er, works.
- The backlight isn't blown because it works, it just stops working after a while.
- If it were something more sinister than caps I would expect it to have just stopped working, never to return.
- You said it's gotten worse than when it first started, indicating that the caps have been leaking electrolyte fluid, thus losing capacitance over time.
- It's repeatable, predictable and follows a set pattern.
- It involves flickering; caps are often used for filtering frequencies and such so a faulty cap means faulty frequencies.

You've built a pretty convincing case there neema - thanks! Now, how to go about replacing the things... I've very little experience with taking things apart and fiddling with their insides. Have you (or anybody else) any advice on how to go about it?

You've built a pretty convincing case there neema - thanks! Now, how to go about replacing the things... I've very little experience with taking things apart and fiddling with their insides. Have you (or anybody else) any advice on how to go about it?

Unless you're a electronics expert, forget about it completely.

"Blown caps" is a trendy solution to many PC problems and if you had a multimeter and the knowledge to check all the caps then you might be able to identify and replace the faulty ones - or you could replace them all I suppose - BUT it's a fiddly and skilled job and not a DIY task by any means.

Even if you just have to buy a decent soldering kit and the spare parts you'll be out a chunk of money which I think would be better spent on a new screen (unless you hanker to learn electronics the hard way!?!?)

There are very, very few places who offer that sort of service either - because it's time consuming and a repair will often outweight the cost of a new monitor (when they start at £60 especially!)

Unless your monitor has some warranty left (have you checked??) I think it's time for a new one. If it's faulty with more than 1 input then you can be reasonably confident your PC isn't the issue at least.